


The Fall of a Sparrow

by gabriel42



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2019-06-02
Packaged: 2020-02-27 20:56:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18746947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gabriel42/pseuds/gabriel42
Summary: “All senior officers, report to the bridge. Our angel is back.”If you’ve been hungering for another round of good ol’ exploring, then come right in, have a seat and enjoy the show. Featuring the crew of USS Discovery, an alien civilisation, some very human questions, and a disturbingly pink flower.





	1. Chapter 1

_“Not a whit, we defy augury. There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come - the readiness is all. Since no man, of aught he leaves, knows what is't to leave betimes, let be.”_  
Hamlet, Act 5, Scene 2

* * * 

**Prologue**

Dawn breaks over a sleeping world. The sun rises ponderously over the horizon, its rays reaching for the snow-capped peaks of the mountains, setting them ablaze in red and crimson. Cradled between the towering, timeless sentinels lies a valley, and amid its dark forests, one may find a village: a scattering of homes nestled together by the side of a river, a communal pasture, a few fields, lightly dusted green with the first shoots of spring tirali. The mist rising from the river covers the scene like a soft blanket, muffling any sound, gentling any movement. The world holds its breath. Then the silence is finally broken by the hoarse cry of a ma'ar – first one, then another, and before long the music of the new day spreads throughout the valley. In the village, men and women rise from their nests, step out into the cool air and gather to greet the day with the first Circle.

That is when they notice.

It hovers low above the horizon, in between Berane's Eye and the Guiding Star, impossible to miss in the deep purple of the early morning sky. It is an intruder in the sacred dance of the heavens, encroaching in a place where it doesn't belong. It glows like an ember, the same dark, pulsing red, almost alive; the same promise of a deadly blaze to be unleashed by the slightest carelessness.

A murmur spreads through the Circle, eyes rising from joined hands to gaze up at the apparition. Whispers spring up, carrying speculation, painting images of futures to come, half-formed hopes, and fears too dark to put into words. They run from mouth to ear, from mind to mind, growing taller and wilder as they go. The Elder who leads their chant stumbles, falters. All eyes turn to her, to their shepherd, and the whispers die down as they look to her for guidance, for an explanation – of what this means, what will happen to them. But the Elder is silent.


	2. Chapter 2

USS Discovery, 05:03h ship's time.

The quarters are shrouded in darkness, the only light coming from the distant stars that stream by outside. The steady, soothing hum of the engines mixes with slow, deep breaths emanating from the bedroom. Suddenly a shrill chime erupts from the comm panel in the wall. The form under the covers stirs sluggishly, trying to get its bearings back in this reality, and a hand fumbles for the response button. On the second attempt, a channel clicks open.

“Captain, sorry to wake you, but I think you'll want to see this. There's been another red burst.”  
Chris Pike feels his heartbeat speed up with a surge of adrenaline, his brain kicking suddenly into gear. The chase is on! He clears his throat. “Lay in a course, warp three. I'll be right up.” Rolling out of bed, he punches another button. “All senior officers, report to the bridge. Our angel is back.”

When Captain Pike steps out of the turbolift, his gaze is immediately drawn to the central viewscreen. A planet spins lazily beneath Discovery, dawn just creeping over the edge of the world to cast it into brilliant colour. Deep blue oceans span large parts of the planet, marbled with white clouds that curl into elegant weather systems around the equator. The continents appear to be covered in lush vegetation. It is a shade darker than Earth's, he notes, suggesting a fainter star – this system could be really old... The most striking feature of the image, however, is the notable absence of any red bursts. He turns to Commander Saru, who is unfolding his tall form from the captain's chair. “Too late again, then?”, is all he says. “It would appear so, Captain,” the Kelpien replies, inclining his head regretfully. Pike turns to the bridge crew at large. “Alright, talk to me.” 

“The planet supports a population of 1.2 billion humanoids, distributed in small settlements across all landmasses except near the poles. There is little indication of industrial structures, though I do detect some use of electricity. No space ships or orbital structures of any kind.” Joann Owosekun reports from the conn. “So we should probably keep our distance,” Pike concludes. “Detmer, take us to a high orbit.”

“The central body of this planetary system is G-sequence star, approximately 6.2 billion years old, at a distance of 0.86 AU from our present position. There are four other planets, but all well outside the habitable zone. This planet also has one moon, which causes moderate tidal forces on the surface. Between the solar radiation and local geographical features, the planet probably supports rich ecosystems in most regions. It is likely that an agrarian society would thrive here,” adds Michael Burnham, who has taken over from the gamma shift science officer. 

“So, do they appear to be in any kind of distress...? Any unusual seismic activity, incoming ion storms, anything of that sort? Plague of potato beetles? There has to be a reason the angel led us here.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he notices Michael stiffening fractionally at the last part. He can practically see the words forming behind the delicate crease in her brow - ‘Sir, there is no evidence to suggest that these events are the work of an intelligent entity, let alone - ’, but she holds her tongue. Maybe, after all they have seen in their pursuit of the signals, she is starting to wonder, too.

Busy silence follows his question, broken only by the soft taps of fingers on displays and the whirring of the computer. “Nothing, sir,” Burnham finally reports, and apparently none of the other officers have anything to add to that assessment. “No unusual radio chatter, no extreme weather patterns, no variations in biodensity that would point to an ecological imbalance of some kind, no large-scale movement of the population that could suggest social conflict... They seem fine, sir.”

Pike shakes his head, frowning. “There's got to be something. Every time the angel has led us somewhere, there has been some catastrophe about to strike, someone who needed our help...” He gazes at the planet on the viewscreen again, taking in the downright disturbing perfection. “Let's stick around a little longer, keep scanning,” he finally decides. “See if we can find out what is missing from this picture.” As the officers around him get back to their analyses, he settles down in the captain's chair and begins to turn the situation over in his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I decided to try my hand at something that isn't slash for once. What do you think so far? I do have a few more chapters drafted, but would love some feedback!


	3. Chapter 3

By 07:00 ship's time, the junior officers of alpha shift have trickled onto the bridge and been informed about the morning's developments by their colleagues in excited whispers. As they settle in to continue their analyses, busy silence continues to weigh on the bridge.

There is a chime from communications. “Captain, we are being hailed – from the planet.” 

“The planet? I thought they were supposed to be pre-warp and unable to see us.” He looks back at Owo for confirmation of her earlier readings. “We did not detect any telescope arrays or other large structures indicative of an inclination towards spaceflight, but there's only so much we can see from up here. It isn't unheard of...” She trails off with a half-shrug.

Pike strides over from the science station, where he had been sifting through the data alongside Burnham. “On screen.”

“It's audio only, actually. And it's not a hail, exactly – though it is targeted exactly at our position. They definitely want to talk to us, sir,” Bryce adds. Pike nods. “Put them through.”

“This is Captain Christopher Pike, of the Federation starship Discovery,” he offers. 

“Greetings!” The speaker sounds male - assuming that assessment holds any meaning for this species - and decidedly friendly. “I am Councillor Hama of Miravia. What is your role?” 

Pike raises an eyebrow at the strangely specific question, but as greetings from alien cultures go, it doesn't even make it into his top ten for weirdness. “I... am the commander of this vessel. We are on a mission of science and would like to learn more about your planet.”

“Of course! We would be eager to share your stories. Please, allow us to welcome you to our beautiful home.”

Well, that was easy... “Thank you for your invitation. We will send a small landing party to make the introductions, if that is agreeable to you.” 

“Yes, of course! We look forward to your arrival!” The channel closes with a click.

“Well, they certainly seem friendly,” Pike comments, looking around his officers to gauge their reaction. Several look surprised, wary even, but nobody voices any outright concerns. Maybe the universe is actually going to play nice for once. He makes up his mind. 

“Ensign Tilly, would you care for a spot of exploring?” The young ensign practically bounces up from her station, trying and failing to contain her grin to something that at least resembles 'seasoned' and 'professional'. “Do you even need to ask? I mean – Yes, sir, it would be an honour to accompany you!” There are smiles among the crew as Pike makes his way to the turbolift, where Tilly is already waiting, almost vibrating in place.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go - time to go planetside!   
> Thank you to everyone who left kudos. This is for you guys! Enjoy :)

When the shuttle sweeps down to the designated landing spot, a flower-dotted meadow not far from the city, they can see that a small crowd has gathered to await them – men, women, even a few children scattered in between. The Miravians are humanoid, but delicate, with slender bodies and chiselled faces, clothed in flowing robes of bright colours. Their circle opens wider as the shuttle slowly sinks towards the ground, their eyes fixed on the foreign craft, eager and curious. 

When Pike steps through the hatch, the smell in the air is... alien, for want of a better word; a bouquet of volatile compounds from a different ecosystem. The dark, almost black trees that surround the meadow look gloomy and threatening compared to their cousins on Earth. But the sky above them is wide and clear, and there is something about the deep quiet underneath the birdsong and the hushed noises of the waiting humanoids that reminds him of the deserts back home. When he steps off the gangplank and into the grass, he can almost feel the familiarity physically pulling at his feet, rooting him to the spot – grounding him. 

“Welcome to our home. May our stories intertwine in inspiring ways.” One member of the waiting group has stepped forward. He is not young any more, with fine lines around his eyes that lend his face a certain gravitas, but his posture is upright and his eyes clear as he looks up at the visitors. Even though he is one of the tallest members of the congregation, his head barely comes up to Captain Pike's shoulder. This must be Councillor Hama. He crosses his wrists in front of his chest, then spreads out his hands as if laying out a panorama. Pike returns the gesture. “We are honoured to meet the people of Miravia. I am Captain Pike, and this is one of my officers, Ensign Tilly.”

Tilly privately wonders whether they actually have classes on how to sound so captainly at some point in command training... But when the councillor offers her the open-handed salute as well, she tries to return it in her best diplomatical manner, and he seems pleased enough with the result. And then they are being waved closer, into the crowd, and Hama turns to gesture towards the settlement. “Please, walk with me. Everyone is eager to meet you, and Miravia is a beautiful city.”

The councillor is not exaggerating, Pike discovers. The road towards the city winds through groves of trees at first, dark-leaved and overgrown, like gnarled giants bearing down on the travellers, but they soon give way to fields and gardens, to carefully tended crops and bright flowers arranged in sprawling geometrical patterns. The conversation with Hama flows easily, and Pike’s anecdotes about his travels never fail to entertain. (Hama particularly enjoys the one about his visit to an outpost of the Imperial Guard a few years ago. Pike, for his part, will settle for never trying to outdrink an Andorian again, and staying away from hot springs for the next five decades or so.) He learns that Miravia is in fact the name of the city they are approaching, and that the locals’ name for their planet is Kevotia. It is named for the All-Mother who sang the First Song, her words giving life to all creatures and things. 

Before long the little huts among the fields grow into houses, gather into larger farmsteads and hamlets, sprout cross-streets and plazas, and then they enter the city of Miravia itself. The buildings lining the streets are not high – two, three stories at most –, but their whitewashed walls gleam in the rising sun, and the painted scenes they are adorned with are so detailed and vivid that Pike almost feels like he can see them moving out of the corner of his eye. The lower stories house shops, with merchants and craftsmen offering their wares and services to a steady stream of customers, vendors offering freshly prepared foods, and the whole place bustles with life. A coppersmith is extolling the qualities of his pots in the most flowery metaphors, a group of children are chasing each other along the street with squeals of delight, and somewhere around a corner, a group of musicians appear to be entertaining a sizeable crowd. 

And even though the musicians’ harmonies are alien, the products on sale are a few centuries out of date, and the children’s games don’t follow any rules that he recognises, there is something about the whole scene that suddenly takes Chris back to the church festivals when he was a boy – the gospel music, the buzz of conversations from the picnic tables, playing tag with Alex and Sasha – he can almost taste his mother’s Sunday roast in the memory, and a wave of nostalgia washes through him, sweet and heavy. 

“Mister!” Pike looks down to find a little girl tugging at his hand. Even next to the other Kevotians, she is tiny, like a sprite, golden curls forming a halo around her small face. “Mister, will you come see my treehouse?” Her amber eyes shine with excitement as she looks up at Pike, seeming not at all concerned at approaching the towering alien. Pike squats down to meet her eyes. “I would love to,” he replies kindly, “but I think Councillor Hama might have a few more stops planned for our tour.” She looks at him for a moment, then adds, seriously: “We could have glini cakes together, and maybe my sister would come, too. She never comes to my treehouse any more.” That is not a dilemma Pike expected to walk into on this mission, but before he can parse a reply, another voice calls out from somewhere off to the left: “Sira, where have you gone to now? We still need to go to the greengrocer’s!” Without another word, the little girl disappears among the passers-by. Rising to his feet again, Pike spots a woman on the nearest corner, the same golden ringlets shimmering in the sun as she bends down to take her daughter's hand. 

“You must forgive them, Captain,” Hama smiles indulgently. “They have never seen another...” “Human,” Pike offers smoothly. Hama nods graciously. “It is quite outstanding to come face to face with another being like you,” Hama says, an excited gleam in his eyes. “We have stories, of course, of gods and demons and mythical creatures from faraway lands that are much like us, but to see you standing here in the flesh...” Something starts niggling at the back of Chris' mind at Hama's words. He frowns. “Councillor... Just how much contact have you had with other sentient species before today?” 

“Why, you are the first, captain. Didn't I mention this?” Hama looks at him with a hint of concern. Chris takes a deep breath. This is… unexpected. A part of his mind starts flashing through Starfleet protocols governing first contact: screening protocols to prevent biological contamination. Ethical compatibility evaluations. Identification of the appropriate planetary-level governing bodies. Guidelines on the exchange of cultural and strategic information. Restrictions on the use of advanced technology. (Another part of his brain is painting a picture of Spock’s face if he could see what his captain’s gotten himself into this time. Sometimes he wonders whether the muscles behind that eyebrow can cramp.) 

“Captain?”, Hama asks tentatively. Pike wonders how much of his reaction showed on his face. “Not to worry; you have made a perfectly good first impression,” the councillor offers reassuringly.   
Chris takes another deep breath, forcing the jittery worry aside to make room for some clear thought. “I'm glad we got off to such a good start,” he begins, schooling his expression into Reassuring Diplomatic Smile no. 2 with the ease of long practice. “It's just that situations like this one – when a culture is faced for the first time with incontrovertible evidence that alien life exists – there can often be...” Shock, fear, xenophobia, worldviews upended, mass hysteria, riots – *Shut up, History of Interstellar Diplomacy*, he tells himself firmly. “...surprise, or even negative reactions. If I had realized your situation...” *How could I miss this?* 

“Oh, but we knew there were other... sentients, you call them? – out there all along.” Hama sounds a bit surprised that he has to explain this. No, not just surprise, Pike realises. There is… conviction. The last time he heard that unshakeable certainty was back home in Mojave, from the shrivelled old lady who must have been the oldest member of the congregation by two decades, and the fiercest by half. The kind of person who Believes with a capital B. Or Spock, maybe, in his interminable quest to defend the conclusions of logic against his irrational human shipmates. “So you had evidence of other intelligent life-forms out there?” He doesn’t see how they could have, since Discovery didn't detect any technology that would allow that kind of discovery, but if Hama says they knew... 

Hama is eyeing him quizzically, like a teacher studying a backward student, trying to find a way to explain the blatantly obvious. “One does not need to see something to know it is there,” he points out. “We may not have known the details, but the...” He gestures forcefully, trying to find the right words. “The shape of it was there.” He looks at Chris, searching for understanding in his eyes. “We know that our story extends beyond Kevotia, and it was clear that there must be others...” He trails off, shaking his head. “Rest assured, captain,” he finally offers, settling for a practical matter. “No one will be shocked by your arrival.”

And however odd the explanation may sound to Pike's ears, it seems that Coucillor Hama is right. The people of Miravia welcome their interstellar visitors as if they had been doing nothing else for years. After Coucillor Hama's little revelation, Pike starts looking more closely at the reactions of the people around them, but he sees nothing but friendly curiosity. Maybe the universe is playing really nice for once, he tries to reassure himself.


	5. Chapter 5

While the Captain makes conversation with their host, Tilly is free to take in the sights and sounds and smells of the alien city, and she is not going to miss a millisecond of it. One of the shops that line the road apparently specialises in flowers, and Tilly is drawn over for a closer look. There are tall stems with blossoms in every colour of the rainbow (and probably several more that she can't even see), large, flat heads whose petals form almost fractal-like patterns; there are clusters of tiny, delicate dots of colour that that spill down from a shelf at the back like a frozen waterfall, and the scents… As Tilly comes closer, trying to absorb the richness of it all, a young man steps out from the depths of the store. By human standards, he looks barely out of his teens, gangly and long-limbed, but his posture and movements are confident. 

“Welcome! I am Keran. What is your role?” There seems to be a trend here, but even thought she’s heard the question before, Tilly comes up blank for an answer. “Hi, I'm Tilly,” she settles on instead. “I'm with Discovery...?” That doesn’t get much of a reaction, so maybe it’s time to go native: “What is your role?”

“I bestow flowers,” the young man replies gravely, with a sweeping gesture at the spread around them. He turns to Tilly and eyes her searchingly. Tilly doesn't know what to say. He hums under his breath, rubbing his hands in thought, as if he was contemplating a particularly thorny problem. His gaze is fixed on Tilly’s face, unblinking. “Um, I should probably get back to…” Tilly’s feet are starting to retreat, putting some distance between her and these odd amber eyes. She has the uncanny feeling that this man can see right through her. But just as she is about to ditch any propriety and flee the scene, Keran’s face suddenly softens into satisfied expression. His hand darts out unerringly to retrieve something from a far corner of the display. He holds the flower out to her. “This one, I think,” he says. Tilly eyes the apparition apprehensively. It is not large, barely the size of her palm, but a truly retina-scorching shade of pink. “A gift,” Keran insists.

“Um, thank you, that's really pretty” Tilly replies, not sure what to do with the sudden shift from creepy stares to gifts of flowers, but settling for a bright smile instead. As she holds the flower up to her eyes, she can’t help but admire how the delicate petals fold into each other, like the masterpiece of an over-excited origami artist. Whatever creature pollinates this plant must be incredibly specialised. Maybe she can find a botanist somewhere here who can tell her more about – “It is the right flower for you,” Keran declares, and he sounds like he is revealing some deep truth about the universe. Tilly’s own comment suddenly sounds frivolous to her ears. 

“You probably see just a beautiful blossom – colourful, complex, but nothing more. But that is not the reason why we prize Orei plants,” Keran explains. “Did you know that, when land has been burned or wasted, Orei are among the first to claim it back? They make their way into the desolation and draw in others after them.” His amber eyes hold Tilly’s gaze, and she can’t seem to look away. When Keran reaches up carefully to pin the flower to her braid, she doesn't move a millimetre. “Thank you,” she manages when he is done.


End file.
